Albany County Attorney Peggy Trent plans to launch Albany County’s first-ever Juvenile Service Board to oversee matters related to youth convicted of crimes.
Trent said the goal of the committee would be to fill holes in the way Albany County courts handle youth.
“My vision is for this opportunity and our community is to take recognition of our juveniles and find a method to address each individual, and determine the gaps we provide in our services,” Trent said. “And once we identify the gaps, we find ways to individualize each juvenile delinquent case.”
Laramie Sheriff David O’Malley said such a committee is necessary.
“It’s something that’s absolutely long overdue,” O’Malley said. “When she brought this to the table, it was something embraced by everyone.”
Wyoming has one of the highest juvenile detention rates in the nation, and is ranked second nationwide for percentage of children under 18 in custody, according to an American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) study from 2010.
“Juvenile delinquency is not a major issue in Albany County, as far as the numbers. But it’s always a concern when you have young people who need guidance,” O’Malley said.
The Albany County Commission members discussed the proposed juvenile service board last week. Within months, Trent said in an interview with the Laramie Boomerang, she hopes to have agreements between city and county governments in place to use the $63,000 in funding received from the Wyoming Department of Family Services.
“If we do not get the agreement together by June, I think we lose that money,” Trent said to the Boomerang.
The revamped service board would oversee youth-related matters like community service, substance abuse treatment and mental health.
“Score resource officers, my under sheriff, several prosecutors and family services will be involved. It will be a different manner of doing business in a more concise way, to reconcile juvenile issues in the community,” O’Malley said.
Society has long viewed children as developing individuals, the ACLU reported, and the area of the brain that is the last to fully mature in children controls reasoning and impulse. Therefore laws have been enacted to guide their moral and cognitive growth, to help children progress, the ACLU said.
“Often times as law enforcement we deal with young people who aren’t bad people, but make bad decisions. And they find themselves entering the juvenile court system,” O’Malley said.
Trent said she engaged in discussions with officials from Rock River, and plans to bring matters before the Albany County School District No. 1 Board of Education as well as the Laramie City Council on Apr. 28.
I have a pretty good intuition on things, and I really think this is going to bring drastic changes to our community,” O’Malley said.
David O’Malley Albany County Sheriff.
